Pagina's

Friday, July 31, 2015

Another pattern release today, the Amare dress and top pattern from Sofilantjes. Amare means love, and the pattern really earns its name,
its lovely. This is the sixth pattern from Sofilantjes that I have sewn
and she pleasantly surprises me every time. At first sight I always like
her patterns, but seeing the end results really makes me fall in love
with the patterns.

During the pre-test we were free to
choose the version we wanted to sew. I had a strong preference for the
dress version with ties. When another tester showed her top version with
the bow, I immediately became jealous. I would not have thought that
the bow would be for me, but I totally changed my mind. A similar thing
happened when I sewed the summer surprise dress. I wanted that bow so
much, that I went back to my pre-test dress and just put a bow on it.

I
had already finished the official testing process and I was in my
usual, who-needs-manuals mode and cut a piece of fabric that matched the
width of the tie. It turned out that the official bow piece is bigger,
it has two pleats in it (facepalm). The result of my dress is cute,
especially with my little one in it, but I wanted the real deal.

I really should practice my bow tying skills and I had to iron the dress again, I know.

To address my "bow" desires,
I sewed up a top for my eldest. Like I mentioned before, she
needs other garments than dresses, so a top is perfect. My kids are
very skinny, and I used a size 4 width and size 7 length. I did this
based on the measurement table and on the table with finished garment
sizes. I like my kids' garments to be truely fitted and based on the
finished garment size table I knew my girl would fit a size smaller than
I would pick on the general size table. Having these tables is a true
asset, now the top fitted perfectly to my standards.

My
youngest is also very skinny. I assumed she had grown a bit since my
last measurement (never ever assume), but it turned out she somehow
became narrower (I probably just miss measured in the past, because we
do feed her). The dress I made her is therefore a little bit too wide,
fortunately the ties can make the dress nicely fitted at the waist. My
ties are shorter than the ties I have seen on other testers, I might
have made a mistake there.

In my previous post I wrote that I
conquered my fear of button holes, well this post's dress was a big part of
that. Not long ago I spoke with a good friend about my troubles of
sewing with my button hole feet. I simply didn't get how to use it.
Because of that conversation I realized I didn't use the feet correctly
and for this dress I forced myself to not use snaps, but buttons. I am
very satisfied with my new skill. Now I really have to start buying
buttons, I realized my stash only contains small buttons. For both the dress and top I used small flower buttons.

The
two uni-colored fabrics are from Soft Cactus as well is the greenish
Flowerworks. The other is from Hamburger Liebe called My Aunties Helga. Both
the cutting and sewing process were relatively short (the pdf only has a
maximum of 12 pages). If I would have to guess you can do the whole
thing in about two hours.

As you can see this pattern is great for playing. The pattern is on introduction sale today and tomorrow only and you can buy it at Sofilantjes webshop.

I
love to hear what you think of my creations. Feel free to leave a
comment in the language you prefer (although Google translate might have
to assist me if you choose something different than English, German,
Dutch or Hungarian).

Thursday, July 30, 2015

My eldest daughter told me two weeks ago that she would prefers all her
clothes to have something special. She likes her clothes to have a
story, which she happily shares with the people around her. She loves to
tell people that this was a tablecloth, or that this was a pillow case,
or that this was a skirt. In case of store bought fabric, she can
settle for reversible clothes or twirling skirts. Tomorrow Pienkel is
releasing her first pattern, the Hiekka reversible wrap skirt. The
reversibility makes it perfect for my daughter, who would like me to sew
something else than dresses.

The skirt has two tie options (long
ones wrapping around the body, or short ones), two front views (curved
or straight front flap) and like I mentioned before, you can choose to
make it reversible. Besides this being just a cool feature, it can be
very useful because kids tend to get dirty quickly, and this way she has
a spare skirt on her.

The blue/green version was actually the
second skirt I sewed. I used soft cactus on one side and an Eline Pellinkhof on the other which I used here and here already). The bias
tape was a leftover piece of the bias I used for this dress. I love how well
it matches with both sides.

This pattern can be sewn into a fancy
skirt. Especially at fancy dinners, my kids tend to be covered in food
stains, making the reversibility extra valuable. The skirt is also great
for everyday wear, you can see that the skirt gives a lot of freedom
movement, she can easily play in it.

The blue/green reversible
skirt closes with snaps (and short ties). The snap version was
officially not reversible, but I made it this way by adding the small
ties on both sides. I used small transparent snaps, so they are almost
invisible.

During the early testing phase, I had made her a
non-reversible skirt. The skirt is a bit too big (issue that is fixed in the pattern now), both length and width
wise, which means it will perfect for next year. I still had to cut the
strings when I put it on her, but she actually preferred it like this.
The strings now go round three times. In the end version of the pattern,
the long string version has small loops to keep the strings in place.

For
this early version, I also made my own bias tape this time with a leftover from this dress. The main fabric is again from Eline Pellinkhof
(I am really trying to decrease my fabric stash), I once bought it for
myself. I still have a big piece left, so it can still happen, I
think it would be a nice June.

The big advantage of using
snaps is that the skirt is a bit more secure, but the strings will give
the skirt a long life. I am thinking about making one with buttons and
button holes. Buttons you can move when your girl grows. I now finally
conquered my fear of button holes!

So, hop over to check out the pattern at Pienkel's site, if you subscribe to her newsletter, you will get a discount to the pattern. The discount is valuable for a week. The pattern is available in a long range of sizes, from 2 years up to 16.

I
love to hear what you think of my creations. Feel free to leave a
comment in the language you prefer (although Google translate might have
to assist me if you choose something different than English, German,
Dutch or Hungarian).

Friday, July 24, 2015

Mandy K designs just released her newest dress pattern, a twirly knit
dress, the type that my daughters adore, the Cyan Lily. I was part of the tester team and during the testing period I
sewed up three dresses and all three are in heavy rotation in our house
already. My eldest immediately declared her red polka dot version to be
her favorite dress.

Twirling, that is what my kids love. If
they get a dress they first check if it twirls and then search for
pockets (which I added in these dresses), they are predictable around
here. Circle skirts are daughter pleasers, but as a sew fanatic, I also
like the dresses that I sew to have more than just twirl. This dress has
that, it has a very exiting back. The dress was inspired by Audrey
Hepburn’s iconic look from Breakfast at Tiffany’s.

The dress
pattern evolved over the course of the pattern test and the red dress is
made with the final version. The first dress I sewed was the blue one,
after that, the neckline became lower and the back higher. The dress can
be sewn with a knit or woven skirt. Some of the testers even sewed the
entire dress from woven, but then you have to adjust the size of the
bodice yourself (the bodice is made for knit fabrics).

My
middle daughter loved her blue dress that much that she immediately
requested a new one, one for her birthday (she just turned four) and she
picked the fabric herself. I didn't come around to sewing it before, so
on the morning of her birthday (those are low key here), I sewed up the
dress. It really is a quick sew, the longest step is hemming (the
circle skirt has a very long hem). I hemmed it with a blue contrasting
knit strip, which gives a great effect during the twirl sessions.

For the blue dress, which is my favorite, I cut the circle skirt in six
pieces, this way all elephants could just stand on their feet. Due to
this pieced circle skirt the dress took up an entire meter of fabric. I
managed to cut the pink flower version from a 70cm coupon that I bought
for 3 euros.

My
experience is that using a heavy knit gives the best results. Both the
blue and red dress are from Hilco jersey (for the red one I also used
interfacing for knits on the neck) and the neck holds up very nice for
those two.

A circle skirt is also great for climbing. My
daughters prefer to wear dresses all day, every day, but I realized that
they have too many dresses. I rearranged their closets and they have
multiple piles of dresses. I will have to come up with a sewing plan for
the coming months that is focused on a different type of garment.

I
love to hear what you think of my creations. Feel free to leave a
comment in the language you prefer (although Google translate might have
to assist me if you choose something different than English, German,
Dutch or Hungarian).

Sunday, July 19, 2015

Summer holiday has started for our kids, which equals end-of-year gifts.
This year, I felt confident enough to hand make them (my earlier gifts
part 1 and part 2 were well received). I was triggered by my eldest
daughter's teacher. She was planning a gifts for somebody that helped
her class a lot, but was now retiring that help. During the year the teacher had seen my
daughter appear in many new dresses and we discussed my sewing hobby on a
few occasions. She asked me if I could sew a pillow case without zipper
that she could decorate with the kids. I was very willing to help and
said that I could do a bit more than a pillow case without zipper. I
proposed to mash up this and this idea from pinterest. The teacher liked
the idea a lot and she decided we would make two, one for the
Tuesday's-teacher as well. The teacher pre-cut the small "pieces" and
the kids sewed them (by hand) together. In one hour 29 kids created 43
flaps, the kids loved it. I helped, which meant non-stop putting thread
through needle eyes.

I drew the owls by hand, I was on a
strict schedule and rushed this process a bit. I hand stitched the upper
flaps, the rest was fixated by the sewing machine and I did add a blind
zipper. The end-result is fine, it is not as nice as the originals
(but not such a pinterest fail as this one). The fact that the kids
contributed and loved to do it, makes the pillows wonderful in my eyes.

Another
pinterest idea that I had been planning to use for a while was this bracelet tutorial. I loved the idea but I do not wear bracelets. I thought they
would be perfect teacher gifts. I made two, experimenting with the
buttons, colors and broomstick size.

For my son's teacher I
made a gift for his class. I adapted this wonderful felt fire into an
idea in which my kids could participate. The fire has three sides and my
eldest (who was his student two years ago), my son (who has been his
student the last two years) and my middle daughter (who will be his
student the coming two years) all decorated a side with textile paint.
My son learned in class this year

that a flame can be blue, so we had to
incorporate that color as well. The base of the fire is red jersey with my heaviest interfacing.

I made the stones from an
upcycled vest and I filled them with small fabric scraps that I have
been hoarding. The scraps give the stones a good firmness and the stones
are heavier than if I would have filled them with pillow filling. The
branches are also filled with scraps.

I love to hear what you think of my creations.
Feel free to leave a comment in the language you prefer (although Google
translate might have to assist me if you choose something different
than English, German, Dutch or Hungarian).

Tuesday, July 14, 2015

My two eldest kids go to circus class (just started recently) and last
weekend was the last class before the summer holiday. On this last class
the kids all gave a solo performance and they were allowed to pick
their act. My son picked the trapeze and my daughter did a hula hoop
act. For this special occasion they were allowed to dress up like true
performers and I took it as a sign to finally sew them some circus
clothes (which they can use for regular circus class). I kept the outfits relatively plain, but believe me that they
look more like circus performers than in their usual short trousers and
non-matching T-shirt.

For my son I used a swim trousers pattern from
Ottobre 3/2009 and a shirt pattern from Ottobre 3/2011. My son has a
sensitive skin and I choose to use cotton jersey and a cotton velour
jersey (the dark blue one). The velour jersey doesn't stretch as much as
usual cotton jersey so I chose an envelop neckline to be sure he could
get his head trough the hole. He only wanted to pose with his little
sister so she is just decoration here.

My daughter was very
clear about what she wanted to wear. She described to me that she wanted a
swimsuit with a skirt. I went through all my Ottobres and found one in
1/2007. When I showed her the pictures she said she wanted a longer
skirt, one that would hide her entire bottom, and I complied.
She also picked the fabric from my closet. I wasn't a big fan of the
combination but in the end it works fine. I finished the skirt with a rolled seam, so it cruves a bit upwards unfortunatly. Does anybody know a remedy for this?

The pattern prescribes
framilon elastic, but I didn't have that (never used it) so I made it
work with some narrow elastic. The result is fine, especially from a bit
far, but I did order framilon elastic. I was intrigued by the prospect
of hemming an elastic neckline with it.

The acts themselves are
on video, so we have no good quality action pictures. I made two freeze
frame pictures, they are a bit blurry but I wanted to add them anyway.

I love to hear what you think of my creations.
Feel free to leave a comment in the language you prefer (although Google
translate might have to assist me if you choose something different
than English, German, Dutch or Hungarian).

About me

I am a Dutch mother of four (three girls and one boy) and an academic. I love to create and use this blog to share my creations with the world. I knit, crochet, sew, bake etc. and many of those skills I learned from bloggers around the globe. I hope you like reading about my creative adventures and that they may inspire you.